Robert Pogson

Well, having time to sort through the piles of junk around here, I found another gem, a brand-new PC. Never been run. It still had a factory-installed sticker over the power connector.

I checked it out:

• Intel Celeron D 2.8 gHz Smithfield? 1MB Cache, dual core, 64bit
• only 512 MB DDR2 RAM
• 80 gB SATA drive
• DVD
• strange desktop compact case Lenovo type 8994 doesn’t let heat rise…
• gigabit/s NIC on-board

I won’t even mention the software. It’s 32bit and obsolete. I did not even get as far as “I decline.” Now I have choices:

• AMD64 Debian GNU/Linux
• “Accept” that other OS
• use it as a server
• use it as a desktop

I am tempted to use it as a terminal server but it lacks RAM. It would be awesome for the English teacher’s cluster. I could add 4gB DDR2 for about $100. That might be a good investment.

We are short of storage on the LAN. This thing could hold two 500gB drives I plan to acquire.

We don’t particularly need any more GNU/Linux desktops at the moment any more than we need more XP machines. 20 PCs are on the way and we expect to acquire 10 more monitors to get some sidelined machines working.

As a server the thing is limited to two drives easily and with a bit of work, perhaps four, two SATA and two PATA. As a desktop, the thing puts out a lot of heat. What were they thinking? As a server 64bitness wins big on throughput. As a terminal server 64bit could make better use of 4 gB RAM.

I think 64bitness wins the discussion. XP should go. I don’t need one more XP machine to manage. For now, 512 MB means terminal service is out. Probably a GUI is out. I will make a file/backup/clonezilla server out of it. This CPU is overkill for that but the students and I could use it for building kernels or other applications just to say we did it. It could compile and serve fairly well. RAM is on the wishlist.